If you’re looking to fill up your smartphone, tablet or laptop with great content, there’s a lot more than just music, videos, ebooks, and games.

Without costing a dime, there are many tens of thousands of “old time radio” shows – from the golden age of radio – available for streaming or downloading.

You might be asking yourself “Why would a future-looking technology journalist want to fill up his phone with radio dramas popularized in the ‘40s and ‘50s?”

Yes, I see the irony. But you’d be pleasantly surprised at how entertaining these are – and they’ve kept me sane while commuting in a car or resting my eyes on a plane. Or, in many instances, I'm playing a game on my phone or tablet while listening to these shows at the same time. These bite-sized old-time radio (“OTR”) shows are typically 20- to 40-minutes in length.

We’re not talking audiobooks here, which are typically narrated by one person, but rather, these are well-acted radio plays, often with music and sound effects. Because you're using your imagination to "see" the characters, environments and actions, these shows feel wonderfully intimate and personal.

Just like other media, there are different genres for different tastes. Comedy fans, for example, might prefer to hear the likes of Jack Benny and Abbott and Costello, while those who prefer science fiction would likely get a kick out of X Minus One or Orson Welles' (in)famous War of the Worlds broadcast.

Survived by the Internet and MP3 files, most of these radio shows – which were popular before television took off in the 1950s – still hold up well in the 21st century. That is, if you can get past some of the classic stereotypes (such as the Irish cop), sponsor jingles about cigarettes, and everyone calling each other “dahling.”

Because the copyrights expired for most of these shows, you can download and listen to them for free. Or if you can’t be bothered, there are OTR podcasts to subscribe to. Or for complete collections, you can buy them on disc or hard drive. However you acquire them, you can fill up your device with downloaded OTR or stream away.

Enjoy, and spread the word.

Where to get OTR shows

Web sites, satellite radio: Archive.org is the best online resource for free OTR, which houses many tens of thousands of shows you can download – one-by-one or as a complete series – and you can then listen to these MP3s on any compatible device. You’ll also get photos, show descriptions and comments from listeners. Shows can be searched by name or browsed by average review rating, number of downloads, number of reviews or recent additions. Also bookmark RelicRadio.com and RUSC.com (Are you sitting comfortably?), which let you listen to more than 35,000 shows. Those who listen to satellite radio might not be aware of an old-time radio station that streams shows 24/7, called Radio Classics (Channel 148).

All of the Relic Radio podcasts are free.(Photo: Relic Radio)

Podcasts, apps: There are many dozens of free OTR podcasts to subscribe to. Most are divided into genre, such as The Horror! or OTR Westerns, or they'll be posted by name of show, such as ones devoted to Dragnet, Escape. Lone Ranger or The Shadow. iTunes is popular for subscribing to podcasts and syncing with mobile devices, but there are many other podcast aggregators, too. Be sure to check out the Relic Radio podcasts; they're all free but the narrator -- who introduces each segment with a bit of historical information -- usually asks for a small donation at the end of the episode. A number of apps are also devoted to OTR, some of which let you stream shows while others have a download option.

Buy on hard drive, disc: If you have a lousy Internet connection, want complete collections, or can't be bothered with finding and downloading episodes online, you can always buy OTR and have it shipped to your door. OTRCAT.com lets you buy discs for $5 apiece, sold by show or theme (genre). Another option is a hard drive with many thousands of OTR episodes, such as the $74 portable drive at OldTimeRadioDVD.com; the 500GB drive is packed with more than 74,000 radio shows and other audio and video material. There are also OTR collections to buy on eBay and online classifieds sites like Craigslist.

Surf Report readers, do you ever listen to OTR? If so, how do you acquire them in the digital age?